FTC chief raises concerns about online tracking of consumers

The head of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) says new methods for tracking consumers across different devices are raising “additional questions and challenges.”

“Some of the techniques that companies employ to collect data passively across devices mean that online tracking is even more hidden from the typical consumer,” said FTC Chair Edith Ramirez on Monday, according to the prepared text of her remarks.

{mosads}“And, as data about consumers is compiled and shared by an increasing number of companies in the tracking ecosystem – advertising firms, exchanges, and onboarding companies, just to name a few – the number of entities who have access to online information collected about consumers continues to grow.”

Her comments came at the beginning of a commission workshop on the practice, called cross-device tracking, that allows marketers to target ads to a user on one device based on their behavior on another.

It has become significantly more common as an increasing number of Americans adopt connected devices in addition to their home computers or laptops. Now, marketer may wish to reach a consumer on their phone or tablet.

The practice concerns privacy advocates who worry that it is becoming more difficult for consumers to avoid such tracking.

“In the case of both types of tracking the best solution is increased transparency and a robust and meaningful opt-out system,” officials from the Center for Democracy and Technology said in public comments filed with the FTC. “If cross-device tracking companies cannot give users these types of notice and control, they should not engage in cross-device tracking.”

Ramirez gave a nod to those concerns in her remarks.

“While tracking itself is not new, the ways in which data is collected, compiled, stored, and analyzed certainly is,” she said, adding later that “these concerns are exacerbated by consumers’ lack of awareness of, and choices about, tracking.”

But she also said that cross-device tracking has some benefits, like allowing users to pick up reading a book on their tablet where they left off on their phone.

She also noted that the commission had undertaken enforcement actions against actors in the advertising-tracking space and was happy to see companies creating features to protect consumer privacy.

“Working through these novel and complex issues together today and in continuing conversations will help ensure that consumers’ privacy interests are protected while allowing for continued innovation in the digital marketplace,” she said.